


a study in parallel lines

by TolkienGirl



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Drawing, F/M, Gen, Mythological References, Rare (Gen) Pairings, basically an excuse to fic my two faves, many parentheses were used in the writing of this story, set between Civil War and Ragnarok
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-13
Updated: 2018-10-13
Packaged: 2019-08-01 07:49:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16280540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TolkienGirl/pseuds/TolkienGirl
Summary: Loki is tired of ruling. So why not visit earth?





	a study in parallel lines

(To be king is to carry a stone on your chest, two on your eyes, and another in place of your heart.

You do not wish to rule, not really. Not if your people do not know who you are.)

 

The mortals have a legend, old to them and old enough to you—it was some thousands of years past. That is time.

(The point, as the point of a dagger is—until Thor rode to Jotunheim, and you with him, you knew not time. Not at all.)

Hermes, then Mercury—that was the name of their trickster. He was fleet and sure of foot; he never stayed anywhere, for long.

(You wonder if, in any story, he wanted to be king.)

 

Earth’s Mightiest Heroes have fractured like a dropped goblet—sharp and spilling. Loki knows that one rings himself safely behind iron, and steel, and a city.

And as for the others—the soldier, the witch, the widow—they slink away to a far-off country, somewhere in a spread of land that never knew Loki’s name.

(But there are tricksters there, too. Every world has its thieves. Thieves are the only immortals of a dying race.)

 

(The soldier disdained you, as did the rest. But there is something about him, something haunted, something that you did not seek out or press in your misguided attempt to overthrow their foolish, beloved globe.)

(Oh, how you want it. How you want the people’s cheers. Their weary feet, the way they laugh. The way your brother loves them.)

The soldier went down in ice. Loki can understand that.

It was long, long before he rose again.

Loki can understand that too.

 

In Wakanda, Loki slips in between trees and past the mortal shields that hide a rich and flowing kingdom. It reminds him of Asgard, or, at least, the Asgard that he knew as a child.

Then, _not belonging_ had seemed like a thing to be challenged and defeated. It had been a rite of passage, rather than a rite of the dead.

So.

Wakanda.

The soldier.

Silver falls thunder from the lips of mountains. It is easy enough to take the form of a jungle cat, of an antelope, of a bird with shining plumage and sharp eyes.

What did his brother find among these people that he could not find in his own?

(Not you. You know what he could not find in _you_.)

 

The soldier sits alone, back to a tree that may or may not have stood in this forest as long as this kingdom has lived.

Paper and a pen flash in his hands.

An artist.

Loki has lived in a universe of arts—the grim statues, the mosaiced streets, the gleaming vaults. Above all, and above anything—magic. What need has he for a scrap of a sketch in human hands?

(You lean closer.)

 

The soldier draws faces. They are not faces of people Loki knows. He has no reason to; until a blink of mortal time ago, he only rarely came to Midgard.

Why would he know the faces of one man’s past?

The soldier sighs, and crumples a sheet. Starts on another. This is a woman, with dark hair and accusing eyes.

Loki shudders away the memory of Sif. Sif, who may have mourned him, though he dares not find out. Sif is seven realms away, because she thinks that Asgard is safe.

(Because she thinks that you are dead.)

 

Sometimes the soldier sits, hands on his knees and no pen in his hands, and looks at the sky. The shining bird perched on a branch above could tell him a thing or two about the sky.

They were born of ice, in one way or another.

They ruled, one way or another, and it did not suit them.

Or maybe it did.

Either way, they are here.

 

Loki returns to Asgard, and waits.


End file.
